After opting to bowl first, Morne Morkel gave Kolkata Knight Riders the perfect start by removing Aaron Finch (5) and Ambati Rayudu (0) early, and went on to complete his quota of fours overs giving away just 15 runs.

MI were in a spot of bother at 37 for 3 when Corey Anderson (55*) joined skipper Rohit Sharma in the middle, and the duo went on to add 131 runs for the fourth wicket to help MI to a total of 168 for 3.

Rohit Sharma lead from the front and blasted an unbeaten 98 off 65 balls with the help of 12 boundaries and four sixes.

In their chase, KKR got off to a bad start as skipper Gautam Gambhir broke his bat and then went on to lose Robin Uthappa early.

However, the skipper did lead from the front hitting a half century to lay a solid foundation for the the run-chase.

Manish Pandey played a pivotal role scoring a quick-fire 40 off 24 balls to shift the momentum in KKR's favour.

Suryakumar Yadav was the star for KKR as the 24-year-old clobbered an unbeaten 46 off 20 balls to hand his team the opening victory.